Darvin Ham has poignant words about Lakers’ focus following Friday’s loss

The Los Angeles Lakers lost a key game in terms of playoff positioning on Friday night to the Minnesota Timberwolves, 110-102.

It’s one thing to lose to a more talented team, but it’s very distressing to a coaching staff and fan base when a team loses because it was simply outworked.

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With Anthony Davis putting forth a dominant offensive game with 38 points, Los Angeles had a real opportunity to take this contest. But for a good portion of the night, especially in the second half, it simply lacked enough energy and aggression to get the job done.

Afterward, head coach Darvin Ham publicly reminded his players through the media that they have no excuse to not be motivated, locked in and energized at this point of the season, especially with what’s at stake.

The Lakers fell short in several of the “effort” categories. They got outrebounded by five, and they only mustered 10 fast-break points, which was something else Ham pointed out in his postgame presser. As he put it, it looked like his team was “playing in mud” instead of forcing the pace and imposing its style and tempo on Minnesota.

It resulted in L.A. shooting only 41.9 percent from the field and scoring just 68 points after the first quarter.

The team is now one game behind the 10th-place New Orleans Pelicans for the final play-in tournament spot in the Western Conference.